Hyperspeed Dreams by Anna Carven

Chapter Eighteen

All of a sudden,the ship went still. One by one, the little blue lights winked back on. A faint hum resumed in the background.

Zharek breathed a sigh of relief.

Nythian chuckled softly.

Tasha glared at the aliens. “What just happened?”

“Lodan fixed it,” the big warrior said casually, as if this sort of thing were as normal as sitting down to a bowl of cereal at breakfast. “Told you. He can’t stand when things get out of order.”

“You know me too well, brother.” A familiar voice drifted toward Tasha from the darkness, making the fine hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. Goosebumps rose on her forearms. Heat surged through her body, seeping between her thighs.

Back so soon?

Does you always have to get so damn horny whenever he shows his face? It had happened so many times already. It was always so damn fast. She’d never lost control of her body like this before.

Ambrosia had forcibly stripped her of control. She’d never wanted that.

This was different.

She found herself… wanting, only she didn’t know how to want.

“Are you going to explain what all that was about?” Tasha didn’t allow even a trace of her wound-up state to escape into her voice as she turned to glare at Lodan.

He stood in the doorway, eyes blazing, his entire body thrumming with tension.

Tasha’s clit began to throb. She resisted the urge to squirm. Her feet were welded to the floor. He had her utterly transfixed.

It was possible.

But not for someone like her… surely. These aliens wanted to repopulate.

She didn’t know if her body was even capable of that anymore.

Why me?Why is he looking at me like that?

“For some reason or other, the ship decided she wanted to kill you,” Lodan said, his tone deceptively mild. “Putting her down was a real pain-in-the-ass. After all the effort it took to save your life, I am not going to allow some cursed ancient drug to destroy you.” He began to walk slowly toward her. “This Praetorian of yours… do they have what we need? Because I will raze their compound to the ground to get it if I have to. Do you understand why, Tasha Sedova of Earth?”

“No,” she said quietly as their eyes locked. “I do not understand why you would go to that extent for someone like me.”

Someone like me… who has blood on my hands… who has done nothing but kill… who was Praetorian’s bitch for far too long. I don’t deserve any of this.

Suddenly, Lodan was right in front of her, so close that she could just reach out and…

Stop.

Stop thinking that way! It’s not for you… he’s not for you.

“Clearly, you don’t know us very well,” Lodan replied in English, his voice dropping to a whisper. “I respect what you’ve done. You sought freedom while trying to protect your own. You would choose death rather than remain a slave for the rest of your life. Believe it or not, we understand that feeling, Tasha. We have been there.” His hand flicked out.

She flinched.

We have been there.

The callused pads of his fingers grazed her forehead as he brushed away a stray lock of her hair. The gentleness of his gesture was so at odds with the rest of him that she actually shuddered.

“Zharek.” Lodan’s voice—stern, authoritative, and infused with heat—rumbled right through Tasha’s bones. His golden eyes traveled across her face slowly, deliberately, drinking her in. “Tell me your findings. What is wrong with her?”

“You tell me,” the medic sniped, looking decidedly snarky. But his expression quickly changed as Lodan shot him a glare that could freeze the depths of hell itself. “Well, the humans have somehow gotten her hooked on a drug that should not exist in this part of the Universe. Enqua. It’s an ancient drug that was used by our Zor ancestors to keep their Kordolian slaves under control.”

“Can it be fixed?”

“Perhaps.”

“Perhaps?” Lodan’s left eyebrow rose dangerously.

“I need more information. This is… outside my usual realm.” The medic winced, as if that fact was terribly hard for him to admit. “I’ll have to go searching through our copy of Ashrael’s hidden library. It’s going to take some time. In the meantime, I would recommend that you go down to Earth with a few of your First Division buddies and storm whatever human stronghold you need to in order to obtain the supply she needs.”

“I will gladly do that,” Lodan replied. “In the meantime, you had better make sure she is stable.”

“She’ll be functional for the next rotation or so. My analogue won’t stop her cravings, but it will save her life. Her heart isn’t suddenly going to stop beating or anything like that. In fact, she doesn’t really need formal monitoring. I will just…” Something appeared in Zharek’s hand. Before Tasha had a chance to react, the medic was standing right beside her.

Jeez.This guy was a medic, not a warrior, but he moved damn fast. Not as fast as Lodan and Nythian, but faster than an ordinary human.

Probably almost as fast as her, if she hadn’t been so dazed.

“What are you doing?” Lodan was already there, his voice like steel as his hand clamping around Zharek’s arm, causing the medic to wince in pain. The warrior hissed something in his native tongue. Zharek nodded frantically.

In the background, Nythian snorted softly in amusement.

The pain faded from Zharek’s face. His expression turned wily. “Just stick this on her chest.” As Lodan released him, he placed something in the warrior’s palm. “You already know what the colors mean, but I’ll remind you, considering you never have to wear one of these. Blue is stable. Green is a warning. Purple is deterioration. Get her to me immediately. Red is bad. She is at risk of imminent death. Black is catastrophic.”

“Wait a minute,” Tasha blurted, terribly disoriented by Lodan’s closeness. For some reason, she got the feeling he could snap at any moment.

Beneath the cold, stony exterior was something wild and primal and volatile.

It was seeping into her skin… between her thighs.

Her heart thudded wildly.

“What is it, Tasha?” The medic clasped his long-fingered hands and tilted his head ever so slightly. Now he was calm; patient, as if he had all the time in the Universe for her.

Strange guy.

Tasha gave up on trying to read him.

Hewas even worse than the others.

She stuck her chin out obstinately and gave the medic a long, hard look. “My hands might be infused with metal, but I’m perfectly capable of sticking your damn monitoring thing on my chest by myself… if that’s what it really is. Give it here.”

Irrational anger surged inside her as she held out her hand. I’ll do it myself.

She was tired.

Tired of being an experimental guinea pig for the Praetorian.

Tiredof having her fate controlled by others—even him.

Especiallyhim.

This crazy alien. He was looking at her again. He was so close that his crisp, intoxicating male scent surrounded her.

She couldn’t stop looking at him. His golden gaze was driving her nuts. She imagined what it would be like to…

Have him hold her.

To have him frantic for her…

It struck her.

She wanted to fuck this stubborn, infuriating, too-perfect, lethal-as-sin silver alien, who had done nothing but protect her ever since they first met.

Was he a bad guy?

She didn’t know. She didn’t care anymore. The drug or analogue or whatever the hell Zharek had injected her with had made her a little less jittery, but it hadn’t lessened the excruciating need that coursed through her body.

Not one iota.

She wanted him.

No manipulation, no strings attached.

But just as her mind started to open up to the possibility of daring to want…

It seized up…

And her entire body went cold.

She couldn’t… she just couldn’t. There was something standing in the way, like a wall of thick, impenetrable ice.

That was their doing.

The fucking Praetorian.

The mind control program.

The endless lies.

Gage and his disgusting acts.

Just forget about all that. Put it away.Move on!

But she couldn’t. She was fucked up. Twenty-seven years old and full of metal and a proficient killer, and yet she couldn’t even handle attraction toward an alien, even though he was everything she never knew existed.

This guy…

She tensed as he held out his hand, palm upwards, fingers open. “Take it.”

“What is it?” She saw a small glowing blob, shaped like a starfish. It pulsated in his hand, emitting the palest shade of blue.

“A simple monitor. Zharek will keep an eye on your vital signs and notify us immediately of any deterioration.”

“Oh.” Fingers trembling, Tasha reached out…

And stopped.

The way he was looking at her right now…

Like he wanted to devour her.

Suddenly, she was angry again, and she didn’t know why. Fury coursed through her, caustic and all-consuming, so powerful she could barely contain herself.

She schooled her expression to icy stillness. It was the only way she could deal with the storm inside.

“Here.” Lodan placed the star-monitor in her hand. He allowed his fingers to linger; to curl around her trembling hand and coax it to stillness. His touch was pure molten fire, adding heat to the inferno of her anger, making her insides clench with need.

He knew what he was doing.

She could implode at any moment.

Bastard.

“Place it over your heart. It will stick.”

“It isn’t going to kill me, is it?” she asked half-cynically, freezing as his slender, callused fingers caressed the rough pads of her own fingers, sending a thrill of anticipation through her.

“There are many things in the Universe that can kill you. Zharek’s harmless little monitoring device isn’t one of them. Neither am I.”

Tasha was no longer aware of her surroundings. Lodan’s burning amber gaze invaded every last inch of her consciousness.

Something about him was different—as if the outer layer of his icy self-control had been peeled away to reveal…

I don’t even know.

Refusing to become a transfixed rabbit in the headlights, Tasha lifted her top a fraction and swiftly slid the star-thing under it, challenging Lodan’s intensity with a defiant glare of her own. What do you want from me? Really?

Was she just a curiosity to him; a novelty that he could discard at a moment’s notice?

No…

They wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble if they planned on discarding her.

Can I trust you?

In Tasha’s world, trust was something only idiots believed in. She didn’t trust anyone—not even Alexis. She was pretty sure her sister had succumbed to some sort of Stockholm syndrome.

“Come with me, Tasha.” Lodan beckoned to her with a swift, silent gesture. Barefoot and clad in his loose casual attire, his stance deceptively relaxed, he looked like a character straight out of some otherworldly story. But there was a wildness about him she hadn’t sensed before.

Remove all the alien ship-tech, and she could be in some goddamn dark fantasy.

“What do you want, Lodan?” But she couldn’t erase the hard edge of distrust from her voice.

The alien seemed to understand. He dipped his head ever so slightly in a gesture of acquiescence. His gaze softened. “There is a lot of anger inside you.”

Amongst other things, Tasha thought wryly.

“Perhaps… there is something that can help.”

What would you know about that?

“Come with me, Tasha,” Lodan said again, with terrible, undeniable insistence.

This man wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

She could try and resist him… she could go back to her quarters and curl up in her bed and wait… she could seek comfort in her family—in the humans that barely knew her anymore.

But she didn’t want to do that.

“Fine,” she uttered, suddenly breathless as he reacted with a decadent fang-tipped smile.

Her heartbeat accelerated in anticipation.

Of course she wasn’t going back to her quarters.

Somehow, she felt more comfortable with these strange, fierce aliens than she did with her own people.